Power-assisted mechanical transmissions are known, in which the movements necessary to change gear are obtained by means of hydraulic or, more rarely, electric actuators. A power-assisted mechanical transmission is necessarily combined with a power-assisted clutch controlled by one or more hydraulic or electric actuators.
The clutch and transmission are normally physically separate and connected by a propeller shaft, which may vary in length from a few centimeters to a few meters.
It has recently been proposed to integrate the clutch in the transmission casing to form a compact integrated clutch-transmission assembly. Integrating the clutch in the transmission casing also has the advantage of simplifying vehicle assembly by reducing the number of component parts for assembly inside the engine compartment. Known solutions, however, have the drawback of involving complex, time-consuming assembly of the integrated clutch-transmission assembly.